Processing Smart meter data with Simplecortex

[Digit]

Hi all,

Wanted to show you the latest thing I'm working on right now. It involves a lot of things I've never done before, so to me it's very exciting.

Since a week I'm logging the P1 port of our smart meter that was installed 6 days ago.
For that I had to place a laptop near the smart meter, so that's not really good as permanent solution
And because it was time for something completely new, I decided to use a Simplecortex this time:

Simplecortex

DSC_7616s.jpg (44.16 KiB) Viewed 9285 times

The status right now is that the Simplecortex can (almost) be connected to the P1 port and it will send the P1 data over its Ethernet connection for further processing.
But that's not all, I'm going to use this Simplecortex to transform my smart meter into a messaging client.
Although I'm not there yet, the results sofar are promising.

If you'd like to read more, try the smart meter and Simplecortex link.

[ludom]

Hi Digit,

Nice project! (and a lot of challenges?)
What are the advantages to create from your Simplecortex a "messaging client"? Can you "talk" to that client so it will respond on some (self defined) commands, and then send some stuff back (P1 readings etc.)? Anyways, Interesting stuff

[Wim2008]

Will you inform us futher about this project?
Would be very nice.

B.R. Wim

[Digit]

Right now my system is a monolithic executable that does 'it' all; not that good and not flexible; I'll never be able to run parts of the system on several pieces of hardware (NAS, router, you name it). This is my first attempt to move processing of the raw data away from that single executable; instead of exchanging raw data, now only data that really means something will be published. Other parts of the system that need that information can subscribe to it. Goal: a distributed, more flexible and robust system. Hmm, this can become a long story and in fact I already wrote about it before, here:
http://blog.hekkers.net/2012/06/24/read ... he-future/
Hope this answers your questions

[Digit]

Will you inform us futher about this project?

I will. The next thing on the list is making the TCP/IP connection a "self-healing" one, in that it will recover from network failures automatically.
BTW here's the latest post about this project:
http://blog.hekkers.net/2012/09/11/proc ... er-data-3/

[Digit]

Small update, where I am now and an overview of what still has to be done:
http://blog.hekkers.net/2012/09/13/smar ... oing-fine/

[Digit]

Another update, as requested.
Today I reached the point where the end result could be tested: smart meter P1 data being published to a MQTT broker and any number of arbitrary clients subscribing to it:
http://blog.hekkers.net/2012/09/16/publ ... r-p1-data/

[Digit]

Last update I guess, cause this project is close to completion
Today I "installed" the Simplecortex near the smart meter, connected it and it started publishing to the MQTT broker.
http://blog.hekkers.net/2012/09/23/smart-meter-online/
My Domotica system subscribes to those topics and the rest goes automagically:

Capture_02 2012.09.23 22.04.26.jpg (17.26 KiB) Viewed 9177 times

Here you see the current power usage of the last half hour or so being displayed on my website (in test-environment), and this is what happens when the wash dryer is finished.

Speaking of RHAD

[ludom]

Nice going Robert!

It's always nice and interesting to follow your projects

The whole MQTT way of thinking is very effective and great. I use something similar "Beanstalkd", but this is more a Work Queue that moves the data around in my application. I'm going to examine the transition to Mosquitto . Looks very nice and runs on Linux too!

[Digit]

Thanks, I liked it too
I don't mind waiting for being able to process the smart meter data a bit longer than I used to, as long as I'm having fun and the end result fits in the bigger picture I have in mind. MQTT has very good support for various platforms (even the smaller ones like Arduino) and it will allow me (big, multi-year project) to 'scatter' my system all over the place. Reason for that is that I see more and more hardware popping up that is capable enough of taking over parts of my system - and MQTT will act as the 'glue'.

Next project will be the OT Gateway - I think it won't be that hard to skip the MAX232 and directly connect the OT GW to a board with UART & Ethernet and add some more 'intelligence' between those 2 connections